Aquaculture 2022

February 28 - March 4, 2022

San Diego, California

THE GENETIC ARCHITECTURE OF OSHV-1 TOLERANCE IN A PACIFIC OYSTER BREEDING POPULATION

Konstantin Divilov*, Noah Merz, Blaine Schoolfield, Tim Green, Chris Langdon

Department of Fisheries, Wildlife, and Conservation Sciences, Coastal Oregon Marine Experiment Station, Oregon State University, Hatfield Marine Science Center, Newport, Oregon, USA

divilovk@oregonstate.edu

 



OsHV-1 currently causes mass mort alities in Pacific oysters in Tomales Bay, California, USA, and a virulent microvariant of this virus has recently been detected in San Diego Bay, California, USA . Selective breeding of oysters for disease tolerance is one of the best mitigation strategies available for reducing the impact of OsHV-1 once it has become established in a bay. Selective breeding conducted by the Molluscan Broodstock Program (MBP), a Pacific oyster breeding program at the Hatfield Marine Science Center (Newport, Oregon, USA), has increased the likelihood of survival to OsHV-1 (Tomales Bay variant) in the MBP oyster breeding population by 21 percentage points. Understanding the causal genes controlling OsHV-1 tolerance can make selection more accurate and increase our understanding of the mechanisms controlling innate immunity in oysters.  Conducting  a genome-wide association study (GWAS) in  the MBP breeding population using SNPs from next-generation sequencing (NGS) data, we found a region on chromosome 8 that was significantly associated with OsHV-1 tolerance. Furthermore, we found that this region is significantly positively correlated with the gene expression levels of two viral innate immunity genes . Family-based QTL analyses replicated the population-based results but also revealed the existence of family-specific genomic regions that are responsible for OsHV-1 tolerance. This suggests that OsHV-1 tolerance in Tomales Bay is controlled by multiple genes possibly active in different innate immune pathways. Selecting for diverse innate immune pathways in oysters can ensure that tolerance to OsHV-1 stays durable against evolution by OsHV-1.